Bloomberg News reports that Kevin McCarthy, speaker, sent the members of the House for a week irrespective of a clear plan. The House members were sent home so that a government shutdown that is looming large can be kept at bay. The move comes after the hardliners once again scuttled at the Republican conference the spending plans of Kevin McCarthy. This has delivered an embarrassing floor defeat for the GOP leadership for the second time.
Will the move help?
The Republican leader criticized the far right flank since he wanted to burn down the place after the conservatives bucked McCarthy and GOP leadership due to a procedural vote about the Pentagon funding bill. This has thrown the House into total paralysis.
Following the development, members are not planning to return to Tuesday’s session since the probability of a shutdown towards the end of the week has become pronounced.
McCarthy said speaking to the reporters was frustrating because he failed to understand why none voted against bringing the idea and participating in the debate.
Implications of a Failed Vote
The failed vote of Thursday has yet again marked another blow to McCarthy, resulting in him being under pressure and facing an ouster threat. The defense funding bill that derailed garners widespread bipartisan support. This is a sign of how uncontroversial issues mire down in the infighting amongst the Republicans.
What did the Republicans plan?
Bloomberg News reports that the House Republicans had originally planned to be in session during the weekend to halt the passing of a stop-gap government funding bill. However, this strategy is now on ice amidst the infighting occurring within the House GOP conference as well as House Republican leaders that are sending the members packing homes for the week.
According to the many aides and lawmakers, the new plan is for the Republicans to try and complete the work on the long-term spending bills, as their short-term funding bill failed to have necessary GOP votes amidst hardliner opposition.
However, chances are that there is very little possibility that work might get over before the funding of next week’s expiration deadline.
What would the plan do?
The plan outlined by the speaker will keep the government open for 30 days at a $1.47 trillion spending level. This is a commission for addressing the debt and border security package. They agreed separately to move the year-long funding bills to a $1.53 trillion level. But this level is way below the bipartisan agreement that the speaker decided upon with the White House intending to raise the national debt limit.
